by Dan Mitchell | Apr 22, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Welfare and Entitlements
Under current law, Social Security is supposed to be an “earned benefit,” where taxes are akin to insurance premiums that finance retirement benefits for workers. And because there is a cap on retirement benefits, this means there also is a “wage-base cap” on the...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 21, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Health Care, Welfare and Entitlements
Republicans are understandably nervous about polling data showing considerable opposition to the Ryan plan’s Medicare proposal – particularly since they just voted for a budget resolution in the House of Representatives that includes such a reform. Their unease is...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 20, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Government Waste
There are very serious ways to save huge amounts of money from the defense budget, largely by making smarter choices about defining America’s national security. This obviously involves high-profile decisions about whether it is smart to engage in nation-building in...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 15, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
The recent agreement between Obama and Boehner supposedly cuts spending by $38 billion. I’ve already explained that this number is disappointingly small and noted that the effect on spending for the current fiscal year is almost too small to measure. But my analysis...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 15, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Government Spending
By taking advantage of “must-pass” pieces of legislation, Republicans have three chances this year to restrain the burden of government. They didn’t do very well with the ‘CR fight” over appropriated spending for the rest of FY2011, which was their first...
